THIRTEEN
DALE THE CHAIN Saw Man was an artiste. Alex stood shoulder to shoulder with Nash in front of the ice truck, their hands wedged into their pants pockets, both of them gawking at the scene playing out before them.
One man.
One chain saw.
One pile of raccoons.
Dale hadn’t turned around to greet them yet because he was busy carving a fourth bushy tail into the hunk of dead tree before him. The sculpture had to be seven feet tall, and to get the top parts done, Dale stood on a stepladder, wielding his tool with an odd, gratingly loud sort of grace. Ten minutes in, he climbed down so he could work on the rightmost raccoons, finally cluing in to the presence of the DuMonts. The chain saw stopped and the goggles were slid from the face and up to the top of the head.
Dale looked like Tara, from the dark skin to the heavy-lidded brown eyes, to the black hair and slight build. Alex halfway expected him to talk in that interesting dialect of Tara’s, too, but no, he had no accent at all—not even a southern one—when he said, “You must be the DuMont guy. I’m Dale. Nice to meet you. Glad Tara got the message to you.”
Alex extended his hand to shake, but Nash stepped in front of him, motioning at the statue. “This is remarkable. The detail, the way you work to incorporate the grain of the wood. Spectacular work, Mr. Dale.”
Dale smirked. “Thanks. Are you DuMont?”
“I’m a DuMont. I’m Nash.”
“I’m Alex,” Alex said, gently shouldering his brother aside. “The best man. We’re here to get the swan for our other brother’s wedding.”
“Right, that. Sorry about the wedding planner. That sucks the big one.”
“What big one?” asked Nash.
Alex gave him the side-eye. “Don’t worry about it.”
Dale set his chain saw on a picnic table before telling them where to pull up the refrigerator truck. Fifteen minutes later, they had an ice swan that weighed more than Nash situated in the back, the crate strapped in with bungee cords. Alex had made Dale take the top of the crate off so he could look at the sculpture. He was kind enough to comply, not really needing Alex’s explanation about the favor debacle, but Alex gave it anyway as to not be rude.
The swan looked perfect.
“Excellent. Phenomenal, even!” Nash was beaming so much that Alex couldn’t maintain his lousy mood. Enthusiasm was contagious, apparently, and for the first time since he’d driven to New Orleans, he was somewhat looking forward to the wedding and all the hoopla associated with it. Maybe this time, Sol had gotten it right. Maybe this time, it was the match he was supposed to have under God.
They drove back to the hotel making idle chatter. Nash had recently come back from a tour of Portugal and had thoughts about adding Portuguese cuisine to his hotel, The Needle. That was one of Nash’s strong suits; he went everywhere, entrenching himself in other cultures, and he brought some of the best of those things back to Chicago. He’d installed a first-class sushi bar in The Needle complete with a first-class sushi chef, whom he’d gotten friendly with in Kyoto. There was the bar that he’d bought from a closing pub in England, paying through the nose to transport the two-hundred-year-old wood overseas, but it had proven wildly popular. There was a small gallery of local artists on the second floor, and now . . .
“Pastel de nata is fantastic,” he said, referring to the popular Portuguese egg tart pastries. “I’m thinking of adding a small dessert counter, perhaps, or a miniature bakery with good coffees for quick breakfast fare. Starbucks approached us about putting in a location, but I think this would be more intimate. Portuguese cuisine is fantastic. These tarts are just the beginning.”
“I should have you come eyeball The Diamond,” Alex said. “I’ve been thinking about turning the second ballroom into another restaurant. We closed it for renovations two years ago and I haven’t gotten around to touching it. Subletting it out to a restaurateur might take care of the problem.”
“Oh yes, of course. I’d love to help. I like to. Help, that is.” Nash adjusted his glasses on his nose, his fingertip sweeping back and forth in time to the classical music playing on the radio, like he’d become a conductor in their short time in the truck.
Alex would ask about it, but he was pretty sure he’d just be given a dissertation on baroque music or some other inane thing, so he changed the subject instead.
“What you said earlier, about Theresa. About politics.”
Nash smiled. “Mmm?”
“I want to apologize to her. I have before, already, for being abrupt. I broke her camera—long story—so I want to do something special.” Alex drummed on the steering wheel. “Actions speak louder than words. Things have been off between us. Awkward.”
He cleared his throat before adding, “It’s made me an asshole.”
“Ah. Well.” Nash paused thoughtfully. “Do you know what she likes?”
“No.”
“Then the old standards,” Nash said.
“What old standards?”
“Flowers. Roses, unless you know what she likes specifically. Chocolate.”
Yes. Yeah. Good idea.
Wait.
“Do you actually know anything about women?” Alex demanded. “You have literally never once mentioned a girlfriend to me. Maybe I should ask Sol, God help me.”
“Hardly! I’m quite the ladies’ man, though I’ve had a dry spell lately, admittedly.”
“How long is a dry spell?”
“Three weeks? No, two and a half. It’ll be three on Sunday.”
I haven’t had a date in almost a decade.
“Oh.”
Nash’s fingers toyed with the trim on his cardigan. “Monica was part of my book club. Lovely girl, very smart, and she had fascinating views on Tolstoy—that was her thesis topic—but we got debating Nabokov and his best works and things got spirited. C’est la vie.”
“Spirited.” Alex blinked. “About Nabokov. You broke up over Nabokov?”
“Of course we did. There are few hills I’ll die upon, Alex, but this is one of them. Diminishing Lolita because of its commercial nature is ridiculous, considering the cultural effect it had on its audience. We’re still talking about Humbert Humbert to this day! Nabokov himself wrote the book as a source of income, and it’s interesting to note that it released only one year earlier than Peyton Place—”
Why did I ask? No, seriously, why did I ask?
“It’s two things taken care of,” Sol said, sounding weary. “It looked good?”
Alex nodded. “Excellent, actually. That man knows his chain saw.”
“Fantastic.”
“Have you ever dumped someone over Nabokov?”
“Pardon me?”
Alex stood next to Sol, the brothers watching as a pair of burly kitchen staff relocated the swan from the back of the truck to the restaurant freezer. Sol wasn’t thrilled to discover that the Porsche had been left in the parking lot of the truck rental in exchange, but that wasn’t Alex’s problem. It was, once again, Cylan’s. He and The Seaside’s resident chauffeur, Lorelai, were readying themselves to take the fridge truck back so they could pick up Sol’s car. Cylan was apparently over his earlier annoyance.
“Nabokov. Have you ever dumped someone over Nabokov?” Alex repeated.
“No, but I did break up with someone over pudding once.” Sol smirked. “I take it you were talking to Nash. Where is he, by the way?”
“Checking on Mother. I’ll go see her later. She lives with me, so I’m less interesting than you two.” There was a heartbeat of a pause before he added, “Pudding? Really?”
“It was more that she was fucking someone that wasn’t me in the pudding,” Sol said. Alex’s face screwed up in distaste, Sol tittered, and the dynamic of DuMont to DuMont was once again restored.
“Why?” Sol asked.
“Why what?”
“Why are you asking about breakups, of all things?”
“I have to apologize. To Theresa.” Admitting it was another hard crack to his pride, but Alex wasn’t going to lie about it, and he had broached the subject in a roundabout way.
“Again? Did you break another camera?”
“No. I insulted her. Made her think I didn’t want her coming to get the swan with me. That’s not the case—I did—she’s lovely, but I put my foot in my mouth and swallowed, which seems to be all I’m good at when I’m with her.”
Well, not all I’m good at. She made some lovely noises when I had her pinned to that desk . . .
Stop it, brain. Stop reminding me of how she felt.
And smelled. And tasted.
Every muscle in his body furled because that was what Theresa did to him—she quickened his body and saturated his thoughts, which were both intoxicating, irritating things. He wanted better control. He wanted . . . something. Anything. A vestige of the old Alex, whose resolve was granite.
Instead he got sweaty palms and a racing heart.
Sol cast him a sideways glance, likely loading up a pithy one-liner that would make Alex want to throw him into the pool, but at the last second, he seemed to change his mind. “It’s hardly a breakup when you’ve known someone, what, two days? Three? Apologize, tell her this is what you do with that mouth of yours, and if she can’t stand you after the wedding, oh well. You don’t plan to see her again, do you? Any path crossing would be incidental to her visiting kitten.”
“No, I suppose not.”
Which is disappointing.
Alex grimaced. Sol was obviously waiting for him to say something more, but when Alex couldn’t manufacture a single sensible thought, Sol let it go. Instead, he reached into his suit jacket pocket to produce his wallet, rifling through a stack of business cards and plucking out a white one with delicate silver script. “Here. Ask for Delores. Tell her you want the ‘I fucked up big’ DuMont bouquet. I’ve needed a few of those myself lately. Wedding stress has not put my best foot forward, and kitten’s not brooking any shit.”
Alex accepted it, peering down at the good cardstock. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. And Alex—” Alex looked up at his brother, bracing for whatever bullshit thing Sol would needle him about, but Sol just smiled and patted his shoulder. “You’ll be fine. You’re genuine. It’s better to get it all out on the table now so there aren’t any surprises later, mmm? It lets her know what she’s getting into.”
“What does that mean?” he demanded, but Sol slipped from his side and headed for his office, a spring in his step, a trill of a whistle echoing down the hall behind him.